Category Archives: Israel

Many believe that the best way to judge someone is not just by their friends, but by their enemies.

If that axiom is true, then America must be doing something right, because the lowest of the low in the human race are coming forth with their venom and threats in the wake of President Trump’s announcement that the U.S. will move its embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

Just about every Jihadist organization on the planet has chimed in.

Before you assume that President Trump’s announcement will touch off attacks of retaliation, you should realize that all of these organizations have already carried out atrocities and attacks. Moving the embassy to Jerusalem will not change them. It merely draws them out into the open with their disgusting rhetoric:

• Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan “spokesman” Mohammad Khorasani issued a statement condemning President Trump’s decision and called for “all Muslims to unite against kufr (non-believers).”

• The founder and leader of the UN- designated terrorist group Jaish-e-Mohammed, Maulana Masood Azhar, released a threatening statement against President Trump’s decision.

• In a statement posted on on the Ikhwanonline.info website, the Muslim Brotherhood declared the U.S. an “enemy” and “Jerusalem is an Islamic and Arab land, for which we will shed our blood, freedom and life, and we fight every aggressor and every supporter of aggression. This is the way of our Jihad.”

• Al Qaeda released the following statement: “Recognition of Jerusalem as capital of the Zionist entity is blatant aggression by Crusader Trump against the sanctities of Muslims. The surest and shortest way to confront the aggression and arrogance of the Pharaoh of this age, the U.S., is Jihad in the Way of Allah, by targeting its vital interests and the interests of its Zionist and Crusader allies everywhere.”

• Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb: “We call on every mujahid to support the liberation of Palestine, the victory of the Palestinians to purge al-Aqsa of Jewish filth.”

• Kashmir-based Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind: “It is a duty upon Muslims to come forth with urgency and do everything needed to stop the madman sitting in the White House and stop him from dishonoring the sacred land of Bayt al-Maqdis and to storm and burn the embassies of the U.S. and Israel to demolish them. We urge honorable Muslims across the world to attack and harm U.S. and Israeli companies and financial and commercial interests. The honor of Bayt al-Maqdis will be restored by shedding the blood of Americans and Israelis. It is the duty of every Muslim, no matter where, to restore the honor of Bayt al-Maqdis. The Holy Land must be made the graveyard for Jews.”

• The Hasam Movement (Arms of Egypt Movement) released a written statement calling for an uprising in response to the decision.

• Hezbollah: Hezbollah leader Sayyed Nasrallah spoke and said that the most important reactions that must be made are a new Intifada and a new Arab summit. He also said the decision was a legitimate reason to target U.S. forces.

• Al Shabaab: “Trump’s decision to relocate the U.S. embassy is evidence of aggression against Islam and Muslims. We urge all Muslims to take up weapons and defend al-Aqsa from the American-backed Zionist occupation.”

• The Taliban: “The Islamic Emirate strongly condemns recognition of Muslims’ first Qibla Baital Maqdas, as the capital of occupying Israel by the president of America. We consider this anti-Muslim bigotry and a reckless step. The decision by Trump will fan the flames of conflict in the entire world, especially in the Middle East.”

Al Shabaab of Somalia and the entire horn of Africa is one of the deadliest Jihadist organizations in the world. They do not get as much scrutiny as they should because of the primary location of their operations, but it should be noted that Al Shabaab members have been arrested and convicted in Maine, Minnesota and California over the years.

They are perhaps most infamous for their bloody massacre of shoppers at a mall in Nairobi, Kenya a few years ago.

Terror Trends Bulletin has covered Al Shabaab for several years now. Here is our archive of Al Shabaab articles dating back to 2010:

While African countries in the region have stepped up operations against Al Shabaab in recent months, the Jihadist group remains a persistent and dangerous threat as reported by the excellent Long War Journal:

Shabaab continues to remain a persistent threat despite being pushed out of its major urban strongholds of Mogadishu, Kismayo, and other large cities and towns in southern and central Somalia. It still controls large rural areas in southern Somalia, and uses these safe havens to launch large-scale assaults in the country, even with a major African Union mission present. Shabaab has also increasingly been able to mount attacks across the border into neighboring Kenya.

Here is a graphical depiction of Al Shabaab attacks in Somalia, showing just how active the Jihadist group has been. Note the attacks in neighboring Ethiopia, Kenya and Djibouti:

Readers may recall from our article on David Cameron last week that the UK is sending 70 British army advisers to Somalia to battle against Jihad there. Al Shabaab is well aware of the plan and has threatened to behead any captured British troops.

We wish the British troops happy hunting and know that Somali Jihadi barbarians are no match for them on the battlefield:

The mantra from the Obama administration has always been that there is no connection between Islam and violence.

In a move eerily reminiscent of re-education programs of monstrous communist regimes from Stalin to Mao to Pol Pot, Obama even had US federal law enforcement training programs purged of any and all materials that point out the aspects of Islamic doctrine which are violent.

Even the Pope has adopted the same mantra, with the astonishingly ignorant claim that “authentic Islam and the proper reading of the Quran are opposed to every form of violence. {Emphasis added}

The problem is, no one who promotes such nonsense has actually bothered to study Islamic doctrine.

But we don’t have to go back over 1400 years of Islamic doctrine to view the evidence of a connection between Islam and violence. All we have to do is to visit the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) web site and view videos of Islamic clerics delivering sermons in mosques encouraging their flocks to commit acts of terrorism and violence. There are scores of such videos.

It’s one thing for a Christian religious leader or an ignorant Western politician to proclaim that there is no connection between Islam and violence. But when actual Islamic clerics make that connection for us, there is absolutely nothing left to prove.

Either our political and religious leaders are lying to us, or they are ignorant. No other possibility exists.

Here is link to a 5-minute video clip that MEMRI posted 2 days ago of an Islamic cleric at a mosque brandishing a dagger (it actually looks like a bayonet to me) during his sermon and encouraging the worshippers to stab Jews. In view of the recent rash of stabbing attacks against Israeli citizens by Muslims, this cannot be dismissed as mere symbolism…

If you listen to some political pundits on both sides of the aisle, you might get the misimpression that Jihadists target America and America is viewed negatively in the Islamic world because of our support for Israel.

The problem with that line of thinking is that ignores some 1400 years of Islamic doctrine.

Each Jihadist terror organization around the globe has a specific goal in mind and that is the formation of an Islamic state ruled by Shariah.

This is very important to understand because this is a common goal of all the major Jihadist organizations across the world. It is shared by Al Qaeda, HAMAS, Lashkar e Taiba, Abu Sayyaf, Jemaah Islamiyah, Boko Haram, Al Shabaab and others and transcends any localized disagreements over borders and pure politics.

Israel could evaporate tomorrow and the overriding goal of the formation of Islamic states ruled by Shariah would not change a bit.

Those who blame Jihad on Israel need to ask themselves some important questions:

Did ISIS wage Jihad in Iraq and Syria to establish an Islamic state ruled by Shariah law because America supports Israel?

Did the Jihadist terrorist group Boko Haram in Nigeria kidnap 300 young girls this spring because America supports Israel?

Did the Taliban seize power in Afghanistan in 1996 to establish an Islamic state ruled by Shariah law because America supports Israel?

Did the Jihadist terrorist group Al Shabaab attack the Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi, Kenya, in September 2013, killing 67 innocent civilians, because America supports Israel?

Did the Jihadist terrorist group Jemaah Islamiyah bomb resorts in Bali, Indonesia in October 2002, killing 202 innocent civilians because America supports Israel?

Did Chechen Jihadist terrorists massacre 334 people, mostly school children, in Beslan, Russia, because the US supports Israel?

Did Jihadist terrorists with the group Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM) detonate a bomb in Marrakesh, Morroco in April 2011, killing 17 innocent civilians, because America supports Israel.

Of course, the answer to each and every one of these questions is no and the questions and answers prove a point. Jihad is truly global. Tragically, it is one of the most successful “exports” in the world over the past decade.

None of the regions mentioned above have a thing to do with Israel. Most don’t have anything to do with America.

The doctrine behind global jihad is over a thousand years old. In other words, the jihadist doctrine has been around far longer than America has even been in existence.

The Jihadists are not motivated only by our actions. They don’t just react to what we do. They have their own reasons for waging violent Jihad which have nothing to do with America, Israel or anything that you or I have any control over.

The quicker our politicians—both Democrat and Republican—gain a full understanding of this, the better.

Anyone who doesn’t realize that Hezbollah is a Jihadist organization with global reach hasn’t been paying attention.

There are too many Americans in particular who have come to view Hezbollah as strictly an organization limited to operations in Lebanon.

That just isn’t true. In fact, there can be no doubt that Hezbollah has operatives here in America, perhaps many of them. And we know that Hezbollah has supporters, including financial supporters, here in the USA.

But the latest story involving a Jihadist plot by Hezbollah comes from Thailand, a popular tourist destination for Israelis and other Westerners–and a country that is contending with an Jihadist insurgency of its own.

Thai authorities arrested two Hezbollah members who evidently confessed to a bomb plot targeting Israeli tourists.

The two Jihadis were identified as Daoud Farhat, a French-Lebanese national, and Youssef Ayad, who is of Lebanese-Filipino extraction.

Farhat held a French passport and Ayad carried a Philippines passport. Their passports indicated that both were born in Lebanon, but it is not yet certain that the passports are genuine.

Farhat was in Thailand for the first time, but Ayad has visited Thailand 17 times.

Thai investigators believe at least nine suspected foreign terrorists connected to Hezbollah are somewhere in Thailand and that one other possible co-conspirator may have already fled Thailand. One of the other suspects is said to be named Bilal Bahsoun.

The internet has literally been littered with news reports about a new propaganda campaign being waged by the head of the Council on American Islamic Relations’ (CAIR) Chicago director.

The man’s name is Ahmed Rehab and his methodology has been to run advertising on buses to change the public perception of the word “Jihad.”

Rehab has chosen two of the most liberal cities in America in which to conduct his campaign so far: Chicago and San Francisco.

The name of the campaign is “MyJihad” and it aims to convince Americans that Jihad only means “to struggle” or, more specifically, an internal, personal struggle. Rehab claims that this is the “true” meaning of Jihad.

Unfortunately for Rehab, he is only partially correct and any campaign that claims that the term Jihad only means an internal, personal struggle amounts to disinformation. The dualistic nature of Islam, in this case as it applies to the meaning of “Jihad,” is well documented both in historical Islamic doctrine and in contemporary use of the term.

And Jihad definitely does not only mean an internal, personal struggle. In fact, the most widespread meaning of the term that is of particular interest to Westerners who are threatened by Jihad does in fact entail violence.

A false and misleading statement has been attributed to the San Francisco chapter head of CAIR, Zahra Billoo:

“A common misconception of the word jihad is that it means armed struggle or holy war, and that is something that has been perpetrated by many who’ve made careers out of pushing anti-Muslim sentiment.”

Such a meaning for Jihad has nothing to do with anyone with an “anti-Muslim sentiment.” It has everything to do with Islam itself.

Let us examine definitions of Jihad from two authoritative sources.

Jihad According to the Quran

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The first is the Quran itself. In this case, specifically The Noble Qu’ran, translated into English by two scholars: Dr. Muhammad Taqi-ud-Din Al-Hilali, PhD, professor of Islamic Faith and Teachings at the Islamic University, Al-Madinah Al-Munawwarah, Saudi Arabia and Dr. Muhammad Mushin Khan of the same institution. The Noble Qu’ran was published by Darussalam Publishers and Distributors, Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. It has been catalogued by King Fahad National Library. On page 818, in a glossary accompanying the text of the Quran, The Noble Qu’ran provides the following definition of Jihad:

“Jihad: Holy fighting in the Cause of Allah or any other kind of effort to make Allah’s Word superior. Jihad is regarded as one of the fundamentals of Islam.”

Can the Quran itself be promoting “anti-Muslim sentiment” as CAIR’s Zahra Billoo asserts?

Jihad According to Shariah

Our second source is Reliance of the Traveler: A Classic Manual of Islamic Sacred Law.

Reliance of the Traveler is one of the world’s most widely read manuals of Shariah law. It has been endorsed by a variety of Islamic authorities, including Al Azhar University in Cairo, IIIT (International Institute of Islamic Thought) in Herndon, Virginia, the Fiqh Council of North America, the Islamic Fiqh Academy in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, the Mufti of the Jordanian Armed Forces andthe Imam of the Mosque of Darwish Pasha in Damascus, Syria.

These can hardly be termed as those pushing “anti-Muslim sentiment” as Billoo claims.

On page 599 of Reliance of the Traveler, readers can find the following passage:

o9.0 JIHAD

(O: Jihad means to war against non-Muslims, and is etymologically derived from the word mujahada, signifying warfare to establish the religion…

The scriptural basis for jihad, prior to scholarly consensus is such Koranic verses as:

(1) “Fighting is prescribed for you” (Koran 2:216);

(2) “Slay them wherever you find them” (Koran 4:89);

(3) “Fight the idolators utterly” (Koran 9:36);

and such hadiths as the one related by Bukhari and Muslim that the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) said:

“I have been commanded to fight people until they testify that there is no god but Allah and that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah, and perform the prayer, and pay zakat. If they say it, they have saved their blood and possessions from me, except for the rights of Islam over them. And their final reckoning is with Allah”;

and the hadith reported by Muslim,

“To go forth in the morning or evening to fight in the path of Allah is better than the whole world and everything in it.”

Jihad According to Terrorists

If Jihad truly means to “struggle” and not warfare to establish the religion, how does CAIR explain the names of all these terrorist organizations?

Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami (Pakistan, Bangladesh, India)

Islamic Front for Armed Jihad (Algeria)

Islamic Jihad for the Liberation of Palestine (Lebanon)

Islamic Jihad Movement in Palestine (Israel)

Islamic Jihad Organization (Lebanon)

Islamic Jihad Union (Uzbekistan)

Jama’at al-Jihad al-Islami (Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Russia)

Laskar Jihad (Indonesia)

United Jihad Council (India)

Contemporary Video Evidence of Widespread Use of the Term “Jihad”

Finally, there is a mountain of video evidence which illustrates vividly the widespread contemporary use of the term Jihad:

First, we have a 10 minute video from a Palestinian Authority TV children’s show using the term Jihad:

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Next we have a 1-minute video of female terrorists from the group Islamic Jihad:

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Here is a 2-minute news report on Taliban fighters vowing to continue to wage jihad after the death of Osama Bin Laden:

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Then there’s this 6-minute tribute to the “Lion of Jihad,” Osama Bin Laden:

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A 24-second sound byte from British-based Imam Amjen Choudary on Jihad in Islam:

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More from Choudary; in this case a 2-minute warning that Jihad is on its way.

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A 2-minute segment from Dr. Ayman al-Zawahiri, leader of Al Qaeda, on Jihad:

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A 40-second call by Zawahiri to Pakistanis to rise up in Jihad:

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A 3-minute news report on Somali Al Qaeda affiliate Al Shabaab using Social Media to call Muslims to Jihad:

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A 4-minute posthumous call to Jihad by American-born Anwar al Awlaki. Keep in mind that, before he became head of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, Awlaki had been an Imam at mosques in San Diego, Denver and northern Virginia and was regarded as a great “moderate” who was a favorite show pony for “outreach” programs. He was invited to the Pentagon. He delivered sermons to the Congressional Muslim Staffers Association on Capitol Hill. Prominent CAIR officers, employees and members attended these sermons. At least one former CAIR employee who attended Awlaki’s sermons on Capitol Hill in Washington DC is now in jail on terrorism charges:

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A call to Jihad by Yasir Arafat–three years after signing the Oslo Accords…

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A 5-minute call to Jihad by the Chairman of the Association of Muslim Scholars in Syria:

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A 4-minute call to Jihad from the Sudanese Minister of International Cooperation:

President Obama has selected one of the worst possible candidates imaginable to become Secretary of Defense. Chuck Hagel has a history of being weak on Jihad and terrorism, the greatest threat to American lives and national security today.

Hagel’s nomination should become a “teaching moment.” Just because someone served honorably in the uniform of the United States military or has an “R” instead of a “D” after his name, does not automatically mean that the person is strong on national security policy.

Chuck Hagel is as bad on the threat of Jihadist terrorism as anyone in America. Not only has he been on the wrong side of votes on the issue, but his votes demonstrate a lack of commitment on the issue, as well a tendency to enable Jihad:

• Wrong on Iraq

A graphic depiction of the impact of the surge on Al Qaeda in Iraq

Initially, then-Senator Hagel voted in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom to overthrow Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq. But when the insurgency did not go so well, Hagel flip-flopped and called for a withdrawal of US troops in just 120 days back in 2007.

Had such a policy been implemented, Al Qaeda and other Jihadist elements would have emerged victorious in Iraq and the US would have been seen as clearly losing Iraq to Al Qaeda. This would have energized Al Qaeda and given it the biggest recruiting boost since the September 11th, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States homeland. This would have essentially allowed the global jihad to morph at an accelerated rate.

Then, when the US announced the surge counteroffensive in Iraq, Senator Hagel said it would be “the most dangerous foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietnam, if it’s carried out.”

Hagel is clearly no military strategist. The surge broke the back of the insurgency, drastically reduced the violence in Iraq and allowed the US to draw down its force levels in a secure manner.

To be sure, Iraq is no utopia today, but violence levels there are no where near what they were during the insurgency and, most importantly, Al Qaeda was denied victory in Iraq due to the surge.

Wrong on Hezbollah

In 2006 Hagel was one of a just 11 senators who refused to sign a letter urging the European Union to designate Hezbollah a terrorist organization. Hezbollah not only killed 241 Marines, soldiers and sailors in Beirut, Lebanon on 23 October 1983, they also kidnapped and murdered US Marine Colonel William Higgins in 1988 when he was on UN Peacekeeping duty. More recently, Hezbollah was active in fighting US GIs in Iraq and Hezbollah members captured, tortured and killed US GIs in Iraq.

Colonel William “Rich” Higgins, USMC–Kidnapped and murdered by Hezbollah in 1988.

Ali Mussa Daqduq: Hezbollah leader captured in Iraq in 2007. He planned a raid in which 4 US soldiers were captured, subsequently tortured and killed in Karbala, Iraq. He was captured by US Special Operations Forces, but was released from custody when President Obama refused to have him remanded to the US prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Wrong on Iran

Iranian “art” in Tehran

Chuck Hagel has a shamefully weak record on Iran, the world’s foremost state sponsor of Jihadist terrorism and a serial proliferator of weapons of mass destruction and ballistic missiles.

His weakness on Iran goes way back to August of 2001 when he was one of just two US Senators to vote against renewal of the Iran-Libya Sanctions Act. The Iran-Libya Sanctions Act was set up to punish entities for investing in Iranian or Libyan petroleum industries, aiming to prevent Tehran or Tripoli from gaining petroleum profits that could be used to develop or acquire weapons of mass destruction or to finance terrorism.

In September 2007, Hagel voted against designating the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps as a terrorist entity. 76 Senators voted for the bill in an overwhelming bipartisan vote.

In July 2008, Hagel voted in the Senate Banking Committee against legislation imposing sanctions on countries conducting certain business with Iran. The legislation passed 19-2.

In October 2008 Hagel single-handedly killed Senator Gordon Smith’s (R-Oregon) S.970 Iran Counter-Proliferation Act, a bill that had 71 co-sponsors, 36 Republican and 35 Democrat. This act would have strengthened the Iran-Libya Sanctions Act (now referred to simply as the Iran Sanctions Act).

Chuck Hagel: Wrong for America

Leftist pundits are creating a straw man argument by promoting the meme that only the “Jewish lobby” is opposed to Hagel because of his record of not supporting Israel.

This dishonest tactic is merely meant as a smokescreen to mask Hagel’s shamefully weak, longstanding record on Jihad and terrorism primarily directed against the United States and its citizens.

Call and write your Senator and tell him/her to oppose the nomination of Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense. America cannot afford to have someone as weak on Jihadist terrorism as Chuck Hagel.

There is mounting evidence that the global Jihadist insurgency is fully entrenched in the USA.

Note that it makes little difference if the perpetrators are members of a previously known terrorist organization (such as Al Qaeda or Hezbollah) or are lone actors. Actually, it DOES make a difference. It is difficult to combat a shadowy organization like Al Qaeda, but it is far more difficult to combat lone wolf actors. Al Qaeda may be difficult to infiltrate and gather intelligence on, but how do we “infiltrate” a lone Jihadist?

This is symptomatic of a revolutionary Jihadist subculture metastasizing within the American Muslim community, especially within some of its mosques and organizations. This revolutionary subculture has produced an atmosphere in which Jihadis are inspired to act violently on their own, as well as part of organizations.

This is a very dangerous and volatile situation.

Over the last 12 months alone, we have been provided with a stack of evidence of the Jihadist insurgency inside America. Americans have largely ignored this evidence, or at least failed to “connect the dots.” Seemingly completely unrelated cases do in fact have common threads: they are acts of Jihad. And these are not in actuality isolated incidents, but rather are linked by a common ideology that animates and motivates Jihadis everywhere….it’s only some that respond with actual, overt violent action, but many others are inspired to support passively, with words only, or financially. This is a global movement with a unified core ideology and doctrine rooted in Islam.

It is not difficult to go back and research examples of Jihad in America over the course of a calendar year, such as 2011. What follows is a list of incidents, cases, actions, statements and plots which point to a Jihadist insurgency in our midst: (Keep in mind that insurgencies are 80% civilizational/political and 20% violent/militant.):

But let’s not get to worked up about the crazy old loon. After all, he’ll be 76 in August. That will make him 77 by the time the next president is inaugurated. That’s nearly the age President Reagan was when he left office after two terms.

Ron Paul isn’t in this race to win. He’s one of those perpetual candidates for president who just adores the attention.

In his latest appearance on Fox News, Paul manages to stick to his McGovern-like “Blame America First” script with the tired old assumption that Jihad is being waged against us just because we are in Saudi Arabia, or Iraq, or Afghanistan, or especially because we are an ally of Israel. Paul appears to be a disciple of Michael Schuerer, who has been spouting that line since BEFORE he left the CIA.

It is interesting that Ron Paul bases his entire philosophy on the global Islamic insurgency on the opinions of Michael Sheuer. Michael Sheuer epitomizes all that is wrong with America’s bureaucratized counterterrorism apparatus. First of all, he broke longstanding CIA regulations at the encouragement of his politicized superiors to write a book while in active service. This alone makes him a scumbag in my book. Thousands of honorable CIA operators could have done the same, but none did. There is a reason. It’s called honor. Second, Sheuer had a uniquely disturbing career in the CIA. A career analyst with no field experience, he was somehow allowed to become a case officer and eventually found himself in charge of the CIA unit tasked with killing or capturing Bin Laden. He failed miserably. Moreover, if you actually read his work, it is readily apparent that Sheuer has at best a superficial level of knowledge of Islamic threat doctrine. He is appallingly ignorant for someone who was in the position he was in. This has resulted in his belief that we are only being attacked because of things we have done and especially for our support for Israel.

I ask my friends:

Is Jemmaah Islamiya attempting to establish an Islamic state in Indonesia because the US supports Israel?

Are the Chechyan jihadists waging Jihad against Russia because the US supports Israel?

Is Abu Sayyef attempting to establish an Islamic state on Mindanao because the US supports Israel?

Are Jihadists attempting to establish an Islamic state in southern Thailand because the US supports Israel?

Have Nigerian Jihadists attacked innocent Christians repeatedly because the US supports Israel?

Is Al Shabaad conducting terrorist attacks in Kenya and Somalia on innocent civilians because the US supports Israel?

Are Jihadists attempting to create an Islamic state in India’s Kashmir because the US supports Israel?

Have Jihadists killed thousands in attacks on innocent civilians in Morocco, Algeria, Argentina, Brazil, the UK, Spain, Jordan and Bangladesh because the US supports Israel?

Are young Jihadis rioting in France because the US supports Israel?

Why is all this happening? Could it be that there is something more to this global violence than the simple “blame America first” concept that Ron Paul supposes?

According to the Lebanese news website, the Beirut Observer, the Jihadist terrorist organization Hezbollah is planning to attack Western targets. The site based its report on information obtained by a “Western intelligence agency” that intercepted message traffic to that effect.

The Observer reported that unnamed Western intelligence officials think that Hezbollah plans to attack Western targets, based on unusual movement of suspected Hezbollah and Iranian Revolutionary Guards operatives.

The article claimed that the goal of the attack would be to distract global public opinion from indictments expected to be handed down by a special UN tribunal investigating the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri.

Rafik Hariri

It has been widely speculated that the UN tribunal will accuse Hezbollah members of involvement in the huge bomb attack on Hariri’s motorcade.

According to the Israeli news site Haaretz, earlier this week Israel’s counter terrorism bureau issued a warning that terrorists intended to carry out attacks against Israelis and Jewish targets abroad, specifying India, Thailand, Greece and Turkey as areas where an attack could take place. It is not known if the Israeli bulletin is related to the report on Hezbollah from the Beirut Observer.

Al Qaeda is known to be active in Turkey, where anti-Israeli sentiment has been on the rise for some time as Islamists expand and consolidate their political power. In addition to Hezbollah, Al Qaeda or other Turkish Jihadist groups could be motivated to attack Israeli or Jewish targets in Turkey.

Of course, India has been inflicted with a virtual menagerie of Jihadist terrorist groups, both domestic and from neighboring Pakistan. Lashkar-e-Taiba pulled off the spectacular Mumbai attacks targeting Jewish targets, but it is far from the only group operating in India, any of which could be prompted to attack Israeli or Jewish targets in India, either of their own volition or in the service of allied organizations.

Thailand has been wracked by a Jihadist insurgency for years in its southern regions. The Thai Jihadists are somewhat of an enigma and their ties to other Jihadist groups are unclear, but Thailand is an enormously popular tourist destination for Israeli and European tourists.

There is known to be Al Qaeda activity in Greece and Al Qaeda operatives have been apprehended there.

What all this adds up to is we could be talking about one threat or two distinct threats, one reported by the Beirut Observer from Hezbollah and another from Israeli authorities from unnamed terrorists in the four nations mentioned.

The possibility of Hezbollah launching attacks against the West in either Europe or the US has long been a deep concern for national security and counterterrorism practitioners. Hezbollah has been in existence for a decade longer than Al Qaeda and has been amply funded and equipped by Iran. Hezbollah is a much larger organization than Al Qaeda and is known to have cells, operatives and sympathizers spread throughout the world, including Asia, Europe and North and South America. Hezbollah has been referred to as the “A” team of Jihadist terrorism and Al Qaeda the “B” team. In fact Hezbollah trained Al Qaeda terrorists in Sudan during the 1990s.

Hezbollah is uniquely qualified to carry out terrorist attacks in the West. Such an attack would certainly not be unprecedented.

Hezbollah is believed to have carried out two bomb attacks in Argentina against the Israeli embassy in 1992 and at a Jewish Community Center in 1994. More than 120 innocent civilians were killed in those attacks. The attacks are also believed to have been carried out with Iranian support.

An example of suspicious Iranian activity in support of possible terrorist strikes occurred in New York back from 2002 to 2006 when members of the Iranian UN mission were repeatedly caught by the NYPD for conducting obvious reconnaissance of New York landmarks and subways.

We can be sure that, when and if Hezbollah or Iran decide to strike in the West, the targets were already selected and prepped by operatives in place long before the attack occurs.